Allen County Dems Breakfast Meeting

Just a reminder to the regular bunch and an open invitation to everyone else:

The monthly Allen County Democrats breakfast meeting will be held this Saturday, April 12th at Democratic Party headquarters located at 1920 Bluffton Road in Fort Wayne. Representatives from both the Obama and Clinton campaigns will be present to give presentations and answer questions about the candidates. This will be the final breakfast meeting before next month's primary, and possibly your last chance to hear from both campaigns in the same venue.

Coffee and doughnuts will available at 8:30, with the speakers taking the podium at 9:00. As always, we encourage you to bring a non-perishable food item to contribute to the local food banks. In addition, any spare plastic grocery bags you can contribute would be very greatly appreciated as a means to deliver the canned goods. Hope to see you there!

Kevin Knuth Steps Down as Democratic Party Chair

Kevin Knuth has officially stepped down as Democratic Party Chairman but will remain in the position until the official caucus on Jan 12, 2008. I just spoke with him and he cited the extraordinary time commitment required as his reason for stepping down:

I don't think people realize the time commitment involved. It was either this or my job and I'm not going to quit my day job or my family.

Knuth added that a few people had shown interest in the position but he didn't want to mention any names until they decided to step forward themselves. I just wanted to take the opportunity to thank Kevin for all his hard work and success as chairman and wish him well in the future. I only hope the party chooses an equally capable replacement...

Kevin Knuth Needs To Finish His Term For The Party's Sake

Allen County Democratic Party Chairman Kevin Knuth is strongly considering stepping down as chairman at the end of this year despite having one year left on his term. Knuth has been an excellent chairman and the party is starting to turn the corner here in Allen County. However, the Democrats still need Knuth's leadership and energy to continue the progress made over the last couple of election cycles.

In my opinion there is no organized structure in place to keep the party moving forward in the event Knuth steps down as the local Democratic party has been successful because of strong central leadership. The problem with that business model is that once the leadership is no longer in place things begin to crumble. Typically the way to handle this type of situation is to use a transition plan to ease the new leadership into place while they build experience and credibility.

A strong centralized leader must recognize this and plan accordingly. If Knuth decides to step down this quickly then that transition plan will not be in place and the party will surely suffer because of it. I can only imagine the time commitment being a party chairman must involve and the stress it must put on one's family. However, if at all possible, I would strongly urge Knuth to stick around one more year to ensure a smooth transition in the leadership. Knuth has done a great job and it would be a shame to see the party take a step backwards at this point in time...